Monday, December 14, 2009

Make a Heaven out of Hell

Last week I read The Blind Side — mostly a true story. (While I haven't yet seen the movie "The Blind Side", I'm looking forward to it.) Turns out that there's an interesting BYU/Evangelical Christian connection that wasn't mentioned in the film:

"In the film, "Oher needs a 2.5 grade-point average and ekes out with 2.52. The part about a 2.52 is correct, but in fact he needed a 2.65 average. He was able to raise his grades to that average by getting high school credits through a remote-education program sponsored by Brigham Young University. 'The Mormons may be going to hell. But they really are nice people,' Sean Tuohy is quoted as saying in the book excerpt."

Yesterday I read the following quote by Joseph Smith and couldn't help but think of Sean Tuohy's statement. The two fit quite nicely together! It also happens to be the ultimate of "turning lemons into lemonade":

..."let me be resurrected with the Saints, whether I ascend to heaven or descend to hell, or go to any other place. And if we go to hell, we will turn the devils out of doors and make a heaven of it. Where this people are, there is good society.” ("Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith", Chapter 45, quote #21)

The Essence Of Our Faith

"The fundamental principles of our religion are the testimony of the Apostles and Prophets, concerning Jesus Christ, that He died, was buried, and rose again the third day, and ascended into heaven; and all other things which pertain to our religion are only appendages to it."